Percy

XIV

Winter 2010

Nothing really kills the mood of a car ride like the potential that you'll have to fight some dude that everyone loves to the death.

Melody was pretty subdued for the rest of the time she was in the driver's seat. Once the sun set, she started to look tired so I suggested that Bobby take the wheel. It was late when we decided to pull over at a motel just outside of Philadelphia. By all predictions, we were perfectly set to reach New York tomorrow, which was simultaneously relieving and also stressful. Tomorrow was the Winter Solstice, meaning that we were due to have to stop one of the most ancient gods from regaining a physical form. No biggie.

After the situation in the parking lot this morning, we decided that it was better to change up the sleeping arrangement—AKA, having Dakota and I in the same room would be 'no bueno' (Bobby's words, not mine). Hazel, Bobby, and Dakota went into one room leaving Melody, Gwen, and I to the other room.

I was sitting on one of the beds with my back up against the headboard, my hair still damp from the shower, while Gwen sorted through her supplies, waiting for her turn to shower. She winced, holding onto her side for a second; despite our best efforts to heal her, the wound in her abdomen was definitely still tender.

Nosily, I watched her go through her things: she had a couple of the same camp t-shirts that we all were wearing, and she had a bag full of hair products and a makeup bag as well. I guess that came with the territory of being a daughter of Venus.

She glanced up from behind her curtain of black hair, catching me watching her. Before I could avert my gaze, she smirked. "It's okay waterboy; I get the feeling you weren't ogling me."

I nervously laughed, bringing my arm up to lazily scratch the back of my neck. "The name 'Waterboy' is sticking around, isn't it?"

She gave a wry smile. "There are worse things: for example, you could be the person who keeps getting immobilized and constantly needs saving every time we're in a fight. Now that's embarrassing."

Gwen played it off as if it was a joke, but her cheeks were tinged pink. I shook my head. "Hey, it could have happened to any of us."

"Not you," she responded before flicking her eyes to the bathroom door. "Not her either."

I understood where she was coming from, I guess. I don't think there's anything I hate more than feeling useless in a situation. I remembered how stupid I felt in the car when we were being swarmed by earth ogres on the highway and I knew there was nothing I could do to be helpful. Now add being a liability that needs to be saved onto that, and I know I probably would be wallowing a bit too.

I opened my mouth to say something, but Gwen beat me to it. "You know, I think the worst part of getting screamed at by Dido was that she was kind of right about how wrong it was for my mom to manipulate her emotions for her own agenda."

"I mean, all of us have parents who don't exactly have the best track record for considering how their actions affect others. Doesn't that just come with the territory of having a god as a parent?"

She looked away and to the side. She remained silent for an awkward amount of time before she responded, "Sure, I guess, but… I've done it too."

"Done what?"

"Manipulated people's emotions," she clarified. There was a look of shame on her face and she wouldn't look me in the eyes. "I promise I'm normally a really good fighter, but the thing I was always best at was playing with people's emotions. It's a rare child of Venus gift. I just never really thought about the consequences all that much..."

She trailed off, looking around the room nervously. Her eyes briefly flickered to the bathroom door, as if checking that Melody wouldn't walk out at any second, before looking back at me. "I guess I always found a way to justify it to myself. You know how it is: you do something for survival and you tell yourself that it was necessary. Then you do it a couple times where you could've done something else, but it's easier to use the power, and you tell yourself that it was a good strategic move. And then you catch yourself doing it at times because something was just a minor inconvenience and you figure that they'll never find out so it can't hurt, right?"

I swallowed. Part of me felt, just for a split second, happy not to know my past self; what if I was some guy who unapologetically used all my fighting skills and 'son of Neptune' gifts to wreak havoc on others? I shook my head at Gwen. "It happens to the best of us. It's easy to get carried away sometimes."

Gwen's bright blue eyes flicked up to me through a curtain of her black hair and, for just a second, I thought she looked like someone I knew, but I couldn't remember the face or the name of the person I was thinking of. Her head whipped back to the bathroom door for a moment, then she gave me a sad smile. "You don't have to make me feel better about it. Sometimes we deserve to feel bad for the things we've done."

The bathroom door swung open and a pyjama clad Melody stepped out. She glanced back and forth between the two of us, reading the room. She coughed, "Damn, you could cut the tension in here with a gladius. I leave the room for 10 minutes and you guys get all melancholic."

Gwen's cheeks turned a bright pink. She tried to pull off a carefree laugh. "Whatever, it was nothing. We were just delving into the philosophical dilemma of how much the ends can justify the means."

"Riveting," Melody deadpanned, but a smile tugged on her lips. "Get into the bathroom; you stink."

Gwen sighed. "Rude, but true."

She grabbed her change of clothes and her hair products and marched into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her. Melody ruffled around in her pack, looking like she was trying to look busy.

The rest of the car ride hadn't exactly been comfortable: the idea that I might end up in a fight to the death with her childhood best friend really put a damper on the mood. She'd cranked the radio up pretty loudly and let the sounds of Top 40 hits drown out any attempt at a conversation for the next few hours.

I didn't quite know what to do with Melody's ominous prediction. From everything I had heard about him so far, he seemed like a pretty stand-up guy: not someone I would particularly be inclined to fight to the death, at least. I had a feeling that Juno was trying to tell me something else with the mural. I mean, Why would she go through all of that work to displace both of us only to have us fight each other? Why steal my memories? It wasn't adding up.

I wasn't sure that I could convince Mel of that though. I did my best to look everywhere but her direction: I took notes of the sections where the wallpaper was peeling and yellowed. More shuffling with her bag. There was a water stain on the ceiling above the radiator. She zipped her bag shut. Next to my bed, there was a framed generic painting of a cliff overlooking a stormy, grey ocean. She started walking toward me. It was a popcorn ceiling.

I felt the other side of the bed sink under her weight as she came to sit next to me. I finally looked over, and her face was stoic, staring straight ahead. Her wet hair was soaking her purple camp t-shirt everywhere it touched. Her long legs stretched out ahead of her, her feet in those same Hello Kitty socks she wore on the day I showed up unannounced on her doorstep what feels like a million years ago. Her little pyjama shorts were—well, short. I followed her lead and fixed my eyes on the wall ahead.

She waited for about 30 seconds before she broke the silence. "I don't want Jason to die and I don't want you to die."

Her voice was steady and monotone, like she'd mentally practiced saying the words until any trace of emotion was gone. I kept my eyes trained on the wall as I replied, "I'm not particularly interested in killing anyone; besides, we don't know if that's what Juno was talking about."

She didn't say anything or look at me.

I thought about what Gwen had said about us turning out like our parents and how we choose to do the things we do. Turning to look at Mel even though she kept her eyes trained on the wall, I kept talking "You know, you were right: it's unfair that we, without any choice in the matter, get told we have some fate or destiny as heroes or whatever. But we still get to make our own decisions about what we do in the moment. Of course there's some bigger scheme at play around us that we've been left out of the loop on but I don't want to fight Jason and I'll do everything I can to make sure that doesn't happen."

The corner of her lip turned up, finally cracking her emotionless expression cracking into a tiny smile. "It's funny: I think he would refuse to fight you too. He'd find some way to try to restructure the scenario to make it work out the way he wanted it to."

"Sounds like someone I would fight with, not against."

Melody's dark brown eyes finally met mine, but she didn't say anything, just shuffled a bit closer to me, her back still up against the headboard. In a tender gesture, she put her hand on top of mine, which was facedown against the bedspread. "You know, when you showed up on my doorstep, I saw you as a means to an end: just a piece of a puzzle in the journey to find Jason."

I snorted. "I figured that your immediate desire to help me wasn't actually 100% about me."

She smiled a little, before her eyes met mine intently. Her voice was barely a whisper when she said, "I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow but I have to say that I'm glad you're here. I know it sucks for you to have been ripped away from your life but I'm selfishly grateful for it. I don't think I could have come back and stomached this life and these people and all this Roman bullshit without you here."

I got this warm feeling in my chest at the admission. I could feel my cheeks getting hot. I wish I had come up with something equally as meaningful in response—a way to say that I was thankful that she was here on this journey with me—but instead I awkwardly choked on my own spit while overthinking, coughed a couple times, and said, "Uhhh, you're welcome.'

She laughed a big, full laugh that sounded almost musical—I guess that might just be a child of Apollo thing—before looking back at me again. "Has anyone ever told you that you're just so articulate?"

Her sarcastic tone was playful as she beamed up at me with a grin. I was all too aware that her hand was still on my hand and her face wasn't too far from my face—six inches maybe. Suddenly I was wondering whether I'd ever kissed someone in my past life (probably, right? I had to hope so) before I'd gotten my memories erased and I don't know why that's where my brain went but—

The sound of the shower stopped. Melody straightened up, pulling her hand back from mine. "Gwen will be out of the bathroom soon."

"Yeah," I responded dumbly.

Melody started to shuffle off the bed, then suddenly stilled. Then she leaned back over toward me and kissed my cheek softly.

Before I could react, she'd already slid off the side of the bed and made her way into the other one in the room, tucking herself in under the sheets. I followed her example and climbed into the bed and pulled the sheets up to my chest. She turned onto her side to face me and quietly whispered, "Goodnight, Waterboy."

In my dream, I was in a large, round room with a balcony rimming the edge facing out to the night sky. I moved closer to the edge to see the lights of the city shining across the water, and the green spikes of the crown of the Statue of Liberty below me. I must have been standing inside the torch. Somewhere in the recesses of my memory, I recalled that visitors used to be allowed to come inside here, but that was now forbidden for some reason.

I turned my attention back to the room. The silhouette of a woman passed across the other side of the room. Following her, I tried to focus in on a detail or two about her appearance until I realized she was like a live shadow—a blackhole that reflected no light, just sucked it in.

Under her breath, she muttered, "Damn light pollution, taking away from the darkness. Humans and their stupid cities and streetlights trying to make the night less powerful. I miss the good old days before they discovered torches."

I recognized the voice as the woman from my first dream that took place at the Statue of Liberty—ancient and powerful. The shadowy figure moved toward the edge of the room, making her way right up to the edge. Like she was talking to the sky itself, she whispered, "Soon."

Then I could've sworn that the stars started to shift, coming together into the shape of a body against the dark sky for just a fraction of a second before shifting back into their correct places.

All of the light left the room suddenly like someone had blown out a candle, and I was left in the pitch black, unable to see a thing. The ground ceased to exist under me. It was like I was living inside darkness itself for a minute. Nothing else existed, and there was no escaping it. Time ceased to exist—I could have sworn I was stuck in there for days and I felt like I could fade into oblivion in that darkness: forget everything about myself and my life and let the dark, empty entity consume my soul.

The dream shifted. I was standing knee deep in snow in a forest wearing only jeans and a t-shirt, the needles of the pine trees around me giving off a fragrant Christmas-y scent. Snow was falling down in thick clumps, descending from the sky so softly that it looked like it was almost happening in slow motion.

The air was frigid, and I crossed my arms, shivering. After only a few seconds, I heard the sound of yelling and quick footsteps. A small group of kids were racing through the brush, moving about ten yards away from me.

"Get to the clearing!" I recognized the voice—it was Melody, though more child-like. Younger.

"We won't lose them in time!" A boy responded breathlessly. There was the sound of an angry, scratchy roar emanating from the place they'd come from, then the sound of footsteps grew louder.

I started to chase after the kids, instinctively reaching into my pocket for Riptide to help, but came up empty-handed. The kids—I could tell there were four of them: two girls and two boys—were running as fast as they could through the high snow, panting heavily.

I caught up with them just as they reached the clearing: a solid acre of open field space and I got a good look at the group. They must have been about 12 or 13-years-old: they were scratched up, dirty, and soaking wet; they looked like they'd been running from something for a while.

It took me no time to recognize Melody and her twin sister. They were wearing matching windbreakers with their matching braided hair, each carrying a bow in their hands. A younger Dakota had a tourniquet made from a purple camp shirt wrapped around his arm and a nasty gash that was bleeding through its dressing. The other boy was blonde with striking blue eyes and I immediately recognized him as the one who had replaced me on the Pegasus in the painting: Jason.

"How can I help?" I yelled to the group, but they couldn't see or hear me. I was just a silent observer in this scenario.

"What's your big plan now, huh?" Dakota asked, turning to the twins and trying to sound assertive but his fear was audible. Whatever was chasing them was getting dangerously close. They would be caught in a minute or two.

"They're made of ice right? We just have to melt them," said one of the sisters.

Jason flipped a coin, which transformed into a javelin mid-air and landed back in his hand. I love my pen-sword, but I had to admit that it was pretty cool. Way more badass than uncapping a ballpoint.

He looked nervously at the cloudy, gray sky. "I don't know if I can summon enough lightning to make that happen."

One of the twins scowled at him, then rolled her eyes. "We've got this actually. Just keep them at bay if they get here before we're ready."

"What do you mean by 'ready'?" Dakota asked.

The girl ignored him, forcibly grabbed her sister's hands, closed her eyes, and started to sing. After a moment of hesitation, the other girl joined in, their voices combining smoothly.

The sound hit my ears, and it somehow felt like I was lying on a beach somewhere in the Caribbean baking in the midday heat—I could practically feel my cheeks and nose getting red from the heat, even though I knew that a song couldn't do that. I forced my ears to listen closer and I could have sworn they were singing "Here Comes The Sun" by the Beatles but they weren't using any words. I thought back to what Hazel had said while we were on the FedEx truck about the two of them working magic through singing but her description didn't do it justice.

It was otherworldly—listening to them felt like a fever dream. I didn't know music that could sound like a physical presence. I watched in disbelief as a hole opened through the thick clouds overhead, the winter sun shining down through the gap onto the clearing.

The first monster broke through the bush, and then a dozen more followed. The giants were sharp and spiky and translucent, like they were living, breathing embodiments of ice. Their long fingers were like icicles, but with razor sharp points.

Dakota drew a sword and Jason readied himself with his javelin as the monsters started to close the space to the kids. For a second, I thought they were done for—the monsters would be upon them in five seconds—and then I started to get hot. For a split second, it felt like a pleasant spring day, and then it was like a sweltering, humid summer afternoon, and then steam started rising around me rapidly, the snow melting so fast that I felt like my skin was getting boiled off.

Jason and Dakota retreated toward the twins. The ice monsters didn't realize what was happening until they'd already crossed into the sunny circle of light. They started to steam as the heat ate at them, rapidly dissolving their forms into nothing. The heat was unbearable and the glare from the sun streaming down was blinding: I could feel the skin on my arms starting to burn and blister.

Within seconds the monsters were nothing but puddles. The twins stopped singing abruptly, and the air dropped down at least 30 degrees fahrenheit around us. The sun returned to a normal level of brightness in the sky.

Jason scowled, his cheeks a bright pink with a sunburn. "Did you have to almost cook us alive?"

"A simple 'thank you' would suffice!" one of the girls said with faux-sweetness.

The other twin laughed. "Don't antagonize him, Mel!'"

Dakota was standing there bewildered and red-faced with a burn, but the way his eyes stayed trained on Mel was obvious. The kid had it bad for her for years, just like Bobby had said.

Melody sassily tossed her hair back. "I will antagonize as I please! Now come on, let's get out of here."

The group started moving forward through the clearing in a hurry to get to some unknown destination, and I tried to follow up but my feet wouldn't comply—it was like they'd been frozen in ice blocks. I was left standing alone in the clearing, the air growing cold around me again.

"Soon," a voice said behind me. I saw a blonde man in sunglasses and an expensive suit for a split second.

The alarm sounded and I opened my eyes and I was in my bed in that cheap Philadelphia motel. Hazily, I thought: Apollo.

I heard Melody groan from the other side of the room, rolling over to turn off the alarm clock on the bedside table. I studied her face for a second, thinking of the younger version of her from my dream. Hazel had been right: you could tell her apart from her sister pretty easily. She was the leader of the two of them from the start—the one who sang the melody. I wondered if the way they had turned out was a coincidence or if the names had been a type of self-fulfilling prophecy.

Then I thought of the way she'd kissed me on the cheek last night and I decided it's probably best if I didn't think of her at all. I got out of the bed and started to get organized to leave.

It didn't take us long to pack our stuff up and get back into our stolen FedEx truck, which we had hidden in an abandoned parking lot a few blocks from the motel. By the time the sun was rising, we had passed Newark, New Jersey.

Getting caught in rush hour traffic, we were stalled a bit, but by 9 a.m. we had crossed through the Lincoln Tunnel and the busy streets and skyscrapers of Manhattan were gleaming ahead of us. Next to me, Melody tensed, chewing her thumbnail nervously.

Dakota scowled at me from across the back of the truck. "Well, now we're in the one place we've been warned is dangerous to us. Are you going to be our tour guide since you've already been here before?"

His gaze was icy and level at me—he obviously still did not trust me at all—but I managed a nonchalant shrug. "If I've been, I don't remember a thing. Maybe we can find a good tourist map somewhere."

Hazel rolled her eyes. "Welcome to New York."

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